Rhys Chatham

Rhys Chatham is a modern avant-garde legend, but the work he is best known for is probably even more legendary. It was born in 1977 when Ut guitarist Nina Canal heard Chatham repeatedly strumming his guitar’s low E string and declared “Rhys, it really sounds like YOU!” This inspired him to compose an entire piece around one note, played by three guitars and accompanied by a repetitive drumbeat. A powerful, punk-style thrust (Chatham drew inspiration from a Ramones concert he’d just seen) and mass of overtones made it a true hybrid of classical music and rock ’n’ roll. Dubbing it “Guitar Trio,” he performed it early on with fellow minimalist pioneer Glenn Branca, who would claim in print, “This is what Metal Machine Music should have sounded like.”

During the 34 years since writing Guitar Trio, Chatham has presented the piece in numerous iterations, and it has become a touchstone for anyone hoping to demonstrate exactly what a guitar orchestra is. Chatham himself has built on his original ideas in many other pieces, forming massive ensembles that are still primarily focused on single, repetitive ideas. But the importance of Guitar Trio persists, and Chatham revels in it, going so far as to tour it through the U.S. in 2007, hand-picking musicians from each city he visited. A resulting three-disc document, aptly titled Guitar Trio is My Life!, might’ve been expected to close the door on Guitar Trio, but it somehow expanded the piece’s already huge legacy. Expect a new chapter to be added to its endless story when Chatham plays Guitar Trio with an array of Triangle musicians at Hopscotch. —Marc Masters